Academic CentreYMOBILITY develops a comprehensive research programme which addresses the following issues: (i) identifying, and quantifying, the main types of international youth mobility in the EU, and their key characteristics; (ii) understanding what determines which individuals do and which do not participate in international mobility as personal and professional development strategies: their motives, migration channels and information sources; (iii) analysing the individual outcomes in terms of both employability and careers and non-economic terms; (iv) analysing the territorial outcomes for the regions of both origin and destination, in economic, demographic and cultural terms; (v) differentiating between short-term and long-term outcomes, taking into account return migration and future intentions to migrate; (vi) identifying implications for policies in migration but also of education, the economy and housing.
The research will utilise existing secondary data for the whole of the EU, but will mainly rely on primary quantitative data (large-scale surveys) and qualitative data (interviews). The study will focus on 9 countries representing different contexts for youth mobility: Romania, Slovakia and Latvia; the UK and Sweden; Germany, Italy, Ireland and Spain. The policy analysis will be informed by interviews undertaken with key informants. Experimental methods will be used to assess how individuals will respond to different scenarios of future economic and social change.